Words Fail

"This, then, is the essence of being a hipster. Pretending you aren't one."
Psychology Today takes on the sad science of hipsterism. (0)

If life were a Philip K. Dick novel
An elderly man takes his wife into the hospital after she suffers a heart attack and then is told he can’t take her home when she recovers. Increasingly frustrated with the poor care she is receiving in the hospital as her health deteriorates, the man complains and refuses to pay the hospital bills (still unable to take his wife home) in protest. In response, the state has his wife declared unfit to manage her own finances, overrides his power of attorney, and begins forcing his hand. It’s Canadian content, but wrapped in a neat analogy involving Tom Cruise and Colin Farrell, how could you not want to click the link? (3)

Canada's Century
Will global warming help make our Northern neighbor into a superpower? (3)

Magic Bus
Public Service Announcement: The League of Ordinary Gentlemen officially endorses letting your kid walk to school. Also: I hope there’s a special circle of hell reserved for busy-body elementary school administrators. (3)

Democratic Renewal
I recently decided that I need to spend more time paying attention to and writing about politics in my own (Great White) backyard. As such, once again you’re going to see less of me around these parts as my writing will be focused on Canadian politics over at the Commons (where you can also read more Nova Scotia born commenter North). Today; however, I posted an exchange with Dr. Alex Himelfarb on the need for democratic renewal in Canada that I thought might be of interested to readers of the League. read more... (6)

The Organized Labor-Neoconservative Nexus
There’s a lot of interesting stuff in this Nation article on the Progressive split over China policy, but Labor’s belligerent tone is pretty striking:

AAM’s Paul expressed grave concern about China’s efforts to enhance its military power. “The trade surplus is being used by China to build up a military. They want to build a blue-water navy in the Pacific, to develop sophisticated nuclear weapons, satellite-killing weapons. What does that say about peace?” he asks.

Beer Blogging: Are cans better?
Sacrilege, you say? Maybe not: read more... (18)

Intervention and Moral Hazards
Michael Brendan Dougherty highlights an article suggesting that humanitarian interventions actually increase the likelihood of genocide and ethnic cleansing: read more... (0)

Shoup Himself Responds to O'Toole
Donald Shoup has made a career out of studying the effects of government parking mandates on the way we drive and live. After a bit of a blogospheric kerfluffle about free parking, Shoup responds in detail to one of his most persistent and consistently wrong critics. (4)

Lomborg Recants
Well, this is interesting (via Grist):

The world’s most high-profile climate change sceptic is to declare that global warming is “undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today” and “a challenge humanity must confront,” in an apparent U-turn that will give a huge boost to the embattled environmental lobby.

Churchill on Appeasement
Quoting the same article twice is probably bad form, but I had to highlight one of Churchill’s lesser-known lines, which should be thrown back in the face of hawks every time the word “appeasement” is uttered in public: read more... (2)

Patriotism Against Nationalism
From an excellent New Yorker article on Churchill: read more... (2)

Master Plan to Destroy America
Endear yourself to the Mooslims: check. I’m prepared to take bets on how long it will take the anti-Park51 crowd to start citing this new Gallup poll as yet more evidence that President Obama is really a radical Muslim Manchurian candidate  and that the Cordona House Project must be stopped to save America. read more... (17)

The Unapology
I’m sorry, but does anyone other than Andrew Sullivan actually give a shit what Levi Johnston has to say about anything? (6)

This.
Timothy Lee identifies the problem with fusionist libertarianism. I agree in full with his conclusions. read more... (17)

Irshad Manji on Park51
What’s this?  A thoughtful, non-demagogued, and thought-provoking piece on Park51?  Heaven forfend! (5)

C4C Again
Here’s one thing I don’t think has been grasped by the dissenters in the C4C business. You could have had everything that was even arguably good out of Cash for Clunkers without destroying the cars. read more... (20)

Beer Blogging: Heavy Seas Hang Ten
Short Review: Quaffable, but not transcendent. read more... (0)

Regime Change
It was a disaster, a quagmire, a nightmare, and the American government should have never gotten us involved… But, some short term goals have been met and now they’re getting ready to start pulling out, which is at least moderately good news… I speak, of course, of General Motors. (11)

How bad was the Deepwater Horizon spill?
At Master Resource, Paul Schwennesen takes on oil spill alarmism: read more... (11)

Beer Blogging: The Godfather Comes Out of Retirement
If you’ve been following Erik’s debate over the origins of the craft brew movement, you might be interested in the story of Jack McAuliffe, a beer enthusiast who built the first modern microbrewery in 1976. read more... (1)

Beer blogging: What makes a craft brew?
Interesting thoughts from The Washington City Paper on what makes a craft beer. Now that the industry is expanding, do numbers or quality distinguish between micro and macro brews? (1)

Bradbury at 90
Bill Kauffman just reminded me of his excellent Ray Bradbury remembrance (you’ve already caught Bradbury’s tirade against big guvmint, the Internets, and our lack of space travel, right?). (0)

"The Great Ghastly Rand"
NR’s latest on Ayn Rand is quite good. As a side note, I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who enjoyed The Fountainhead a lot more than Atlas Shrugged. (22)

I suppose this was inevitable
Philadelphia starts requiring bloggers to get $300 licenses (via): read more... (14)